A Message From Your Outgoing Greater Toronto Area NAIOP President

Dear NAIOP GTA Members,

It has been my absolute pleasure to have served as your 2023 President.

One of the primary goals of the Board of Directors was to focus on delivering programing that helped educate and develop our members, while ensuring that diverse voices and perspectives from across our industry were at the center of all programming. Secondly, to provide opportunities for our members to grow their connections and networks

We accomplished this through various programs ranging from kicking off the year with a NAIOP Breakfast featuring Spencer Levy & Eric Plesman to the popular NAIOP Ski Day. This year the IDEA Exchange took place in Los Angeles. It was the largest IDEA Exchange to-date, with the most extensive programing we have ever accomplished. It was both educational and inspiring.

The second area of focus was creating opportunities that brought together the real estate industry – from our most senior leaders to students that are looking to join the industry and everyone in between. This was evident at the 21st annual REX Awards, NAIOP Volleyball Event and the ever-exciting NAIOP Development Challenge Finals Event!

I would be remiss not to spotlight our Government Relations Committee who worked tirelessly this year. In addition to our continued work with Campbell Strategies at the provincial level, we created a federal advocacy taskforce. This taskforce consists of all Canadian Chapters and engages Campbell strategies to support advocacy efforts at the Federal level. We also retained Altus Group earlier this year to undertake a study on office space needs in the GTA. The report received significant media attention and helped spark a broader public discussion on office conversions. Toronto’s Vice-Chair of Planning and Housing, Councillor Brad Bradford, brought forth a motion to request staff to further study potential conversions of office space. This motion was considered and passed by the Planning and Housing Committee. NAIOP continued collaboration with REALPAC, BOMA, ULI Toronto on shared issues of interest to the industry. Finally, we continued to participate in numerous consultations with City of Toronto, including:

City parking strategy consultation
Draft emissions performance bylaw
Waterfront LRT
Proposed Emissions Performance Standards
Prohibition Of The Purchase Of Residential Property By Non-Canadians Act

2023 has been a challenging year, however, none of the above would have been possible without our volunteers and board members. Without them, the work we do at NAIOP to support our members and industry would not be possible. My sincere thanks to all of you!

I would also like to thank our incredible sponsors for their continued support in 2023. Finally, I would like to introduce you to the incoming 2024 Board of Directors:

President: John Stewart, Institutional Property Advisors (IPA)
President-Elect: Kevin Hardy, Oxford Properties Group
Past-President: Christina Iacoucci, BGO
Treasurer: Peter McFarlane, Fiera Real Estate
Director, Industry Engagement: Jared Menkes, Menkes Developments Ltd.
Director, Industry Engagement: Chetan Baweja, BGO
Director, EDI: Sunita Mahant, Ivanhoe Cambridge
Chair, Communications: Lorayne Mercado, Manulife Investment Management
Chair, Suburban Committee: Charlie Deeks
Co-Chair, Programming: Brendan Sullivan, CBRE
Co-Chair, Programming: Megan Pfrimmer, Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan (HOOPP)
Chair, Developing Leaders: Kai Tai Li, CBRE
Chair, Sponsorship: Julianne Gu, McCarthy Tétrault
Co-Chair, Government Relations: Leona Savoie, Dorsay Development Corporation
Co-Chair, Government Relations: Noah Gordon, Menkes Developments Ltd.
Chair, Networking Initiatives: Lisa Wu, Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan (HOOPP)
Chair, Membership: Ryan Nelson, Pearl Group
Chair, REX Awards: Aleks Karamarkovic, Graywood Developments
Chair, Education: Kosei Masutani, Pure Industrial
NAIOP Corporate Board Representative: Rebecca Askew, Cadillac Fairview